Icy Blue Eyes

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Piercing, pale blue eyes, and sometimes gray eyes, that seem to look right through you. As a reflection of character, this variety of blue eyes indicates the coolness (as in Rule of Cool) or even coldness (as in cold and calculating) of the person who has them. Tends to overlap with Elemental Eye Colours if the character is An Ice Person.

Examples

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Anime and Manga

Annie Leonhardt of Attack on Titan has these. She's cold, calculating, and occasionally very observant about her world, in addition to being a loner by choice. She's also a Titan Shifter, and one of the most dangerous beings mankind faces.

In Bleach, Hitsugaya (once pictured above) and the Ishidas have blue eyes of the "piercing, icy" variety. Hitsugaya is An Ice Person. Ishida Uryuu is an Aloof Ally (or tries to be) who comes from a clan of Energy Bow-using hollow-hunters. His father Ryuuken takes aloofness to a completely new level.

Mikado from Durarara!!. Early in the series, the audience thinks he's your average Naïve Newcomer, trusting and uncorrupted by Ikebukuro city, but later, we find out he's actually been the cold and calculating chessmaster and leader of the Dollars this whole time, has been Obfuscating Stupidity, and is the type of person you don't want to cross. On one occasion, he actually shivved a guy with a pen. It's at this point that you realize they were actually Icy Blue Eyes all along.

Eyeshield 21 has Shun Kakei which reflects both his stoic personality and his team's water motif.

Ray Lundgren of GUN×SWORD has very narrow and very cold blue eyes that match his cold personality.

Char Aznable, from Mobile Suit Gundam, has these. As explained in Mobile Suit Gundam The Origin, this is also why Char wears a mask: Casval Rem Deikun met the real Char Aznable, and the two were practically physically identical aside from the eyes, with Char's being brown. When they swapped places so Casval could join the Zeon military under Char's name, he kept his eyes concealed so no one would realize he wasn't the real Char.

In Naruto, Naruto's father, Minato, can go from friendly to his True Companions to piercing to his enemies. Naruto himself can now also go to bone-chillingly cold when pissed, to an extent that even the Kyuubi backs off after a look from him.

Evangeline, a icy, cool, calculating, Really 700 Years Old vampire, gets this trope as well as showing her Phenotype Stereotype background. (However, she switches to Green eyes in the first Negima anime.)

Sakuya Ookochi from Sensual Phrase has deep, piercing blue eyes, befitting his Bastard Boyfriend nature. They are often commented upon, due to how uncommon natural blue eyes are in Japan. This is actually a plot point, since Sakuya is half-American and inherited his blue eyes from his father...the evil foreigner who raped his mother, Reiko.

Kiba's human form from Wolf's Rain has eyes that look either blue (icy, piercing variant) or blue-gray. It denotes his Chosen One status, since the other wolves keep their amber eye color even in human form.

Kousei from Your Lie in April has brown eyes in the manga but dark blue eyes in the anime. He starts the anime as a quiet, depressive boy due to his abusive mother and his Parting Words Regret towards her. Kaori has brighter blue eyes and an overall brighter personality, which rubs onto him as they become friends and she brings him out of his shell.

Seto Kaiba of Yu-Gi-Oh! has cold, blue eyes. And then there's, of course, his "Blue Eyes White Dragon".

Noel, one of the main characters of Titan Legends, has eyes that have been described as ice-blue and piercing. His intellectual and somewhat overly-serious personality supports this.

Enoby Dark'ness Dementia Raven Way from My Immortal has "icy blue eyes like limpid tears." The fact that she spends a lot of the story using red contacts means they aren't blue most of the time, though.

Smith in The Matrix fanic Bringing Me To Life has these. His eyes are described as "Icy-blue" and looking into them is described like "Being out in a sub-arctic blizzard." they signfiy his cold and stern personality.

"Reverse Falls" fanworks of Gravity Falls give Dipper and Mabel these sort of eyes. They're portrayed as villains and more-often-than-not are fine with murdering people.

Ripples has Allora, the queen of Meridian before her daughter Weira (mother of Phobos and Elyon). Her blue eyes are described to be like ice or steel. She is a distant traditionalist who doesn't believe in helping the masses much. Neither she agrees much with her idealistic daughter. After the Heart of Meridian leaves her in favor of Weira and Elyon is born, she murders both Weira and her son-in-law Zanden and attempts to do the same to her grandson Phobos in order to make Elyon her Puppet Queen and maintain Meridian align with her visions.

In Thousand Shinji, both Shinji and Asuka have pale blue eyes and pretty arrogant personalities.

To elaborate: a scuffle with Pearl Eyes, an Exile flyer on her first mission, ended with Flare brutally thrashing Pearl and nearly squeezing her to death while she begged for mercy. The narration also makes it clear Flare was deliberately trying to crush Pearl's bones/rib cage, not just going for a choke-hold or grapple.

Gaston, the villain of Beauty and the Beast has pale blue eyes, which appropriately fits his personality as being completely opposite of that of the Beast's, who also has blue eyes, but being the hero, his is darker.

Queen Elsa, an Ice Queen and An Ice Person, in Frozen. Her sister Anna has softer Innocent Blue Eyes so it's clear Elsa's eye color isn't due to her powers. Elsa comes off as cold for the first portion of the film because she represses her emotions due to her ice powers acting up when she gets overly emotional. By the end she's learned to accept herself and her powers.

Jack Frost from Rise of the Guardians has these with a distinct frost pattern. Makes sense, considering that he has powerful ice and snow powers, and he's essentially winter personified. He also seems to cross over into Innocent Blue Eyes territory. He had brown eyes as a human.

In the 1978 film The Boys from Brazil, a number of boys have been cloned and are having their lives socially engineered with the intent that they'll grow up into "Hitlers" and bring about a new Reich. They are described as having the "piercing" variety of blue eyes. Including Indians with (artificially) blue eyes.

Steve McQueen also had piercing blue eyes, which makes one wonder if the "blue-eyed, pretty-boy badass" could be considered its own character type.

Escape from New York: Snake Plissken may have but one eye, but that eye is of the "piercing, icy" variety and ends up creating quite a striking effect, even leading other characters (notably, the Surgeon General of Beverly Hills in Escape from L.A.) to comment upon it.

In Batman Begins, Dr. Crane has the icy, piercing, creepy variety. Tends to be a given with most characters that Cillian Murphy plays since his eyes are naturally like this.

Magneto's eyes are quite a striking blue, which is a good match for his rather cold-hearted view on things.

X-Men: Apocalypse: Professor X's steely gaze when he looks directly at the camera is the very last shot of the movie. It's unique and significant for the character because James McAvoy's iteration either has Innocent Blue Eyes or expresses that he's in excruciating pain due to a Break the Cutie ordeal or being a Broken Bird. It hints that McAvoy's Xavier is tougher than Patrick Stewart's in the original timeline because the former had undergone horrific torture by Apocalypse, and is nearly murdered by him, and what doesn't kill you only makes you stronger. Charles had already fallen apart at the seams once before, and he refuses to do this again even though the hell he was forced to endure in this film is much worse, so the fierce determination in his eyes is a warning that no one should mess with him or his X-Men.

Elijah Wood has eyes of an absolutely piercing blue, and they can turn icy at times, such as in The Lord of the Rings.

Speaking of Middle-Earth films, Legolas and Thranduil both have these eyes which reflect their cold and distant attitudes, though the former is increasingly less so up to the events of the first trilogy.

There's also Thorin, whose icy attitude is due to his Dark and Troubled Past. Apparently, it's a family trait there as well, since Thror also has these eyes.

Major König in Enemy at the Gates, which suits him as a ruthlessly professional Cold Sniper. According to the director's commentary, the reason Ed Harris was chosen to portray him.

In The Lone Ranger, Butch Cavendish's reptilian cold-blooded demeanor is evident in his ghostly blue eyes.

Literature

Roland Deschain of The Dark Tower has faded blue eyes to go along with a piercing stare (in the series, they're often called 'bombardier' eyes and are described as being "the color of icebergs"). He's still basically a good guy, if a complete and utter badass. Jake's eyes become these. As the story goes on, they're described as being eerily similar to Roland's eyes.

This is an oft-referenced characteristic of Corporal Ken "Killer" McCoy, one of the main protagonists in W.E.B. Griffin's The Corps series. We first meet McCoy in 1940, when he's stationed in Shanghai, China with the 4th Marines. He's a rather slightly-statured young man of slightly-below average height, and generally unremarkable except for his ice-cold blue eyes. He gets his nickname (which he hates) after fatally stabbing three Italians in self-defense. Afterwards, people who know his nickname (even if they don't know the story behind it) find his eyes scary. Despite his "killer's eyes," McCoy is actually a pretty decent guy, he just won't hesitate to use violence if he thinks it's necessary (he's rarely, if ever, wrong about that).

Granny Weatherwax, Vetinari, and Susan Sto Helit from Discworld have the piercing kind. (Susan has sort of inherited them from her grandfather, whose "eyes" are pinpoints of blue fire deep in his eyesockets.)

Dumbledore (and his brother, Aberforth) from Harry Potter famously have "piercing blue eyes". But they're good guys. Mainly the intense blue is meant to signify that very little gets past them.

Tycho Celchu in the X-Wing Series gets the 'piercing' variety — an incredibly fast thinker, reserved, calm, and a very good Ace Pilot. Also incorruptible and a Woobie.

In the same series, Ysanne Isard has one blue eye (called "Hoth-cold" in one book). Her other eye is red.

Anakin Solo is the only blue-eyed child in his family (his eyes are always described as icy, though not cold); his brother, sister, and parents are all dark-eyed.

Ben Skywalker has inherited his father Luke's blue eyes, eyes that can swing (often quite suddenly) from innocent to icy at fancy's whim, to the point where it scares Ben himself (to a small extent, anyway).

St. John Rivers, the noble but often insufferable cousin of Jane Eyre, has piercing blue eyes.

Rand Al'Thor in The Wheel of Time is first described to have wide innocent blue eyes. As the books progress, they have changed into the piercing, ice cold type. They switch between gray and blue as well.

A Wrinkle in Time: A Swiftly Tilting Planet: for some reason, Charles Wallace, the main character, has the intensely piercing kind (they can summon a unicorn from a star, they're that piercing).

Dallas Winston from The Outsiders is specifically mentioned to have blue eyes like "blazing ice, cold with a hatred of the whole world". Darry Curtis, determined and tough, also has "cold" eyes like "two pieces of pale blue-green ice".

The fanatic Archbishop Edmund Loris in Deryni, falls under this category. The glares he gives his enemies are at times described as "frigid".

Both Scourge and Hawkfrost from Warrior Cats have ice-blue eyes. And they're both villains, the former being a dictator and the latter being a more sympathetic yet ambitious Manipulative Bastard.

Cordelia Ransom, from the Honor Harrington series, when her eyes aren't filled with fanatical fervor. This reflects her cold, predatory cunning and more than once saves Thomas Theisman from accidentally slipping and saying something that would set her sights on him. After all, Eyes Never Lie.

The Others and the Wights they control are described as having Occult Blue Eyes so intense they burn like fire.

Both Roose Bolton and his son Ramsay have eerily pale grey eyes, variously described as "chips of dirty ice" and "paler than stone, darker than milk". It's apparently one of the distinct Bolton traits; Ramsay looks almost nothing like Roose, but the latter immediately accepted the former as his son as soon as he saw them.

Coira and Arpazia in White as Snow both have what the narrator describes as eyes like cold water, which is neither quite blue nor gray.

In the novel Psycho, the private eye Arbogast is described as having eyes that are "ice-blue and ice-cold".

Most of the Whistlers of A Brother's Price are blue-eyed, and Eldest in particular is alert and calculating and it shows. Not much gets past her.

Redwall: When Martin the Warrior gets angry, his eyes become "chips of ice".

In The Sookie Stackhouse Mysteries Eric Northman's defining feature are his ice blue eyes: "Eric pulled away from me and looked down at me with eyes bluer than mine and harder than mine and colder than the Arctic waste." — Club Dead

The Vampire Chronicles resident Anti-Hero Lestat's eyes can't really decide whether they are blue, violet or gray. Either way, they are described as piercing and so the trope is played straight...at least partially.

In the novel of the same name on which Hannibal is based, the main villain of the story, Mason Verger, is described as having intense, scary, piercing, bright blues eyes—as are his sister and late father(although the sister is a sympathetic character.)

Christian Ozera's most striking physical feature. Goes well with his coolness as a bad boy, and contrasts his actual fiery personality and powers.

Tasha Ozera. The trait runs in the family and serves to mark her coolness. Turns out to go well with her inner ruthlessness.

Kane is famous for his blue eyes, which are described as burning with intense hatred and murderous lust. They are also literally his Mark of Cain.

The eyes of Kane were like two blue-burning crystals of ice. Within them stirred a frozen fire of madness, death, torment, hellish hatred.

Udinaas in the Malazan Book of the Fallen. His eyes are described as 'ravaged eyes, a bleakness like defiant ice in this world of fire'. He is a poster boy for Stepford Snarker, with a cold grin and sharp-tongued retort always at hand, but capable of 'ethereal ease' when no one is looking.

Anne Boleyn's father convinces her she can seduce Henry when he tells her that her blue eyes are "like dark hooks for the soul". Strange choice of words - dark - but Natalie Dormer does have very arresting pale blue eyes (ironically, the real Anne Boleyn had black eyes that were celebrated as her best feature, making the line an odd example of Truth in Television without being Truth in Television).

For that matter, Henry VIII has extremely piercing blue eyes which cause him to look truly menacing from the right angle. This is one of the few physical traits that Jonathan Rhys Meyers actually doesshare with the historical Henry, who was also blue-eyed.

The Ninth Doctor, as played by Christopher Eccleston, has very striking blue eyes that can be either endearingly cheerful or downright scary depending on the circumstances.

Doctors Two through Seven also fit this trope. Eighth Doctor Paul McGann also has blue eyes, though for the the TV movie he fits the Innocent Blue Eyes trope better. His performance in the audio series is as befitting this trope as any of the other seven blue eyed Doctors. The Fourth Doctor fits Creepy Blue Eyes better, as they mostly give him a bug-eyed, Uncanny Valley look and don't seem like they fit comfortably in his head.

The Twelfth joins the lineup of piercingly blue-eyed Doctors.

Supernatural: One of the angel Castiel's signature traits, all the better to do his intense staring with.

The Vampire Diaries: Damon has them. They give him a very piercing stare. In 02x10 Katherine lampshaded how pretty his eyes were.

Sherlock: the titular character's eyes are pale blue, often highlighted, and scary when he gets angry.

Justified has Detroit mob lieutenant Robert Quarles (played by Neal McDonough), who has piercing, light blue eyes. In "Measures," an old woman said that Quarles had eyes like a husky.

John Drake in Danger Man, where his intense blue gaze is lampshaded several times even by Drake himself.

The Prisoner, whose intense gaze even psychs out his captors at times.

Cases of the 1st Department: The thief and murderess in episode "Hatred" is a peroxide blonde with cold icy blue eyes. She is utterly scary.

In The Hollow Crown version of Henry V the titular king has piercingly shrewd, cool and calculating ice-blue eyes; most notably in the scene where he gives his conditions to accept the French surrender. They shift to great big Innocent Blue Eyes when he prays and woos Princess Katherine.

In Peaky Blinders, one of the hallmarks of the male Shelbys is that they all have piercing blue eyes, from ChessmasterTommy to the newest Michael. Ironically enough, Big Bad Inspector/Major Campbell has them as well, to further highlight his parallels with Tommy.

Dr Harrison Wells, the chessmaster mentor, has these, which is fitting since he's the most emotionally detached member of the team, and is usually the one to make the hard calls that go against the Flash's ideals. Although he does care for his team and spends a lot of time with a small, warm smile on his face, his blue stare can be extremely cold when he's angry. His Character Tic of taking his glasses on and off helps to draw attention to this. As the Reverse Flash he usually has Red Eyes, Take Warning, but his cold stare is evident whenever he isn't in costume and helps make his frequent Slasher Smiles even more unnerving.

His Earth-2 counterpart obviously also has cold blue eyes, and in this case they help to highlight his blunt and detached personality.

She's got eyes of the bluest skies. As if they thought of rain. I hate to look into those eyes. And see an ounce of pain.

Video Games

In Fallout: New Vegas, advertising images of Joshua Graham portray him as having piercing, pale blue eyes. Since his eyes are the only part of his face you can actually see, it's very striking.

[PROTOTYPE]: blue eyes run in the Mercer family, but only Alex has ones that almost glow, both highly reflective and eerie. There may or may not be a supernatural explanation for them being that way, but they certainly make him glaring from under his hoodie more intimidating when coupled with the probability that he's making up his mind whether or not to kill and eat you.

inFAMOUS: Cole's eyes are pale blue and glow with electricity when he's mad. Future!Cole/Kessler's eyes have a permanent blue shine, likely due to his advanced age and powers. Lucy Kuo from inFAMOUS 2 gains literally icy blue eyes with she gets her ice powers.

Her hair color has gone from green to brown to blonde over the years, but one thing that hasn't changed about Metroid's Samus Aran is her eyes - every time they've been depicted, they've been a light, icy blue, until Metroid: Other M, where they're green.

Vergil of Devil May Cry has this in accordance with his (usually) cold and distant persona. Interestingly, he and series protagonist Dante are identical, yet Dante's eyes seem to be of a brighter blue while Vergil's are pale-blue.

In Metal Gear Solid 4, Snake's eyes are a very arresting pale blue (described in-game as 'blue-grey') that are given prominent focus on the box art - suggesting his determined and cold personality as well as hinting at his unnatural origin, being the same colour as the genetically modified blue roses that appear throughout the game (with Snake even describing himself as 'a blue rose' at one point). They are notably not the same colour as Big Boss's eyes.

Chell from Portal has a pair of shocking blue-gray eyes that seem to fit with her steely (pardon the pun) determination.

In Final Fantasy VII, eyes like this are a sign of exposure to Mako energy and usually come along with superpowers.

In Final Fantasy VIII, Squall Leonhart and Quistis Trepe both have light blue eyes and are more distanced from the rest of the characters.

Knights of the Old Republic II has everyone you meet in the Polar Academy—all the characters there have a visual motif of snow, cold, and ice. First there's Atris, whose attitude towards the Jedi Exile can most charitably be described as "frosty". She willingly isolates herself there and operates through cold calculation in her one-woman war on the dark side. Which becomes her downfall, by the way. Her Handmaiden servants also have very pale blue eyes and are similarly frosty in their attitude towards the Exile. The one who joins the Exile is a bit of a Defrosting Ice Queen.

In Gears of War, this is a Fenix family trait, though its talked about more in the novels than in the games. It's so bad that Adam Fenix had to take down all the portraits of his ancestors in his home because their icy stares creeped him out that much.

Rena Ryuugu often gets these looks when she's going crazy. Most of the time, though, her eyes are warm and friendly, but when she starts getting those contorted pupils, it's time to run.... Though most of the time she should probably be afraid of you.

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